


Defining

by dilatory



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Drabbles, F/M, Fluff, potential second-hand embarrassment, so much floof, what even is a tag
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-03-14
Updated: 2015-05-30
Packaged: 2018-03-17 18:36:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 11,880
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3539822
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dilatory/pseuds/dilatory
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Crush (noun); for a person, it's usually pretty bad.  But for an angel it may just be the worst thing in all of the world. Or even the universe. It's like being hit by a semi-trailer truck, ten soccer balls, and the plot of a 90's rom-com all at the same time. It's sort of the modern day version of the plague, but with less rats. Kind of. If you're polite enough not to count Dean Winchester as a rat.  </p><p> </p><p>Castiel/Reader</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Intro

**Author's Note:**

> This is the kind of intro chapter to bunch of drabbles, so... enjoy? *throws confetti*  
> (As with all the other stories on here, Y/N = your name.)
> 
> I does not owneth anything to do with the glorious creation that is Supernatural. But once I'm rich enough that may just change.

For the majority of his lifetime Castiel had observed humanity in silence. One apocalypse and two surly brothers later, the angel was finally experiencing the species up close and personal. There were many different aspects of Earth that he greatly enjoyed—burgers and bumblebees being a few. However—as with anything—there cannot be light without darkness, pleasantries without atrocities. And there were plenty of bad things about Earth. In Heaven he had been taught that in humanity there existed nothing but two things: righteousness or evil. It was black and white. It was simple. But in reality, on Earth there was so much more—so many grey areas to be explored. And all of them were equally as confusing. 

The Winchesters were part of that grey area. 

You were a part of that grey area. 

Some demons and monsters were even a part of that grey area. 

And emotions were _most certainly_ the majority of it.

“I’m happy.”

Dean arched a brow, halfway through shoveling a mouthful of bacon and eggs and pancake bits and God knew what else into that oversized pie hole of his. 

“But I’m also sad.”

The hunter swallowed his food most eloquently and settled back against the plush leather of the booth. 

“Kind of a contradiction there, Cas.”

“That is the problem, yes.”

“So…” Dean sipped at his orange juice. “You’re happy, but you’re sad. Anything else to add to that?”

Castiel’s brow furrowed as he thought. “Not at the moment, no. Though these sorts of things tend to flicker in and out…” More brow furrowing. “But at the moment, yes, it is predominately those two.”

“Well, Columbo, any clue as to why that might be?”

“No. That is why I am asking you.”

Dean sighed and reached out to snag another piece of bacon off his plate. “You’ve got to give me more to go on than that, man. What exactly are you trying to figure out?”

“How can one feel both extreme joy and melancholy at the same time?” the angel inquired with a tilt of his head. “I always assumed the two were expressed independently.” 

“Well… it’s like… ” Dean chewed over his thoughts and breakfast simultaneously for a moment or two before he grinned and reached forward for the sole strand of crispy goodness remaining on his platter. “ _It’s like with breakfast._ Eating this last piece of bacon is going to make me mighty happy because, come on, it’s bacon. And it’s delicious. But it’s _also_ going to make me sad because then there won’t be any left. Capiche?”

“I… do not think I understand.”

“It’s an _analogy_ , Cas. It’s not supposed to make sense, and that’s _how_ it ends up making sense.”

“Dean, this has absolutely nothing to do with your breakfast—”

The bell over the diner’s door tingled and the hunter glanced up to see you and his brother sleepily making your way over to their booth. Sam’s laptop was tucked snugly beneath the crook of his elbow and your own arms were preoccupied with balancing a massive pile of notebooks and age-old texts that Dean could already tell would smell like they’d come straight out of the deepest recesses of granny’s closet. 

Sam slid in next to him and you plopped beside Cas, managing to snag a bit of pancake off of Dean’s plate on your way down. You popped the syrup saturated goop into your mouth before flipping to a dog-eared page of one of the notebooks and practically shoving it into his face. 

Dean scanned the mass of jumbled and hastily scratched text with a heavy sigh. Cases could never just be easy, could they? Why couldn’t it just have been a damn ghost… Why a freaking aquatic demon witch? 

“Research going well I assume then, shrimp?”

“It’s not a water wraith.” You tapped at one of the larger clumps of scribbles with your index finger. “It was a good theory and almost everything fits, but I did some digging and found out that the water in that lake was contaminated by argentum photo labs back in the day. A lot of gunk from the factory that they used to develop pictures was dumped into it.”

“Meaning?”

“ _Meaning_ ,” you frowned, swiping another piece of pancake. Dean pulled his plate away to hide it protectively beneath his hunched frame with a hiss of _‘buy your own damn breakfast’_ and you grinned, “that there’s still trace amounts of silver in the water.” 

“And wraiths hate silver,” Sam finished. 

“Right,” Dean nodded. “It burns ‘em.”

“Astute observation, Winchester.”

Dean sent you a withering look. “Shut it, shrimp.”

You smirked and reached over to pilfer his half-finished glass of orange juice. 

“Anyway,” Sam cleared his throat, “Y/N and I wanted to head over to the morgue again, get a closer look at the bodies and go over the medical reports again if we can.”

“Good idea.”

“I want to get samples from the lake too,” you added. “If I can find out what’s in the water then we can rule out at least a few things. It’s not much, but it’s a starting point.”

“I’ll accompany you.”

Dean quirked an eyebrow at the angel and you nodded. 

“Thanks, Cas.” You shuffled through another of the notebooks. “Oh. And, Sam, if you can snag some skin and muscle tissue samples from the vics, that’d be awesome. We should see if this thing is affecting anything, and, ya’ know, not just gnawing them to death.” You tapped at your chin, thinking. “And, Dean, if you could swab the mouth and steal some hairs that’d be awesome.”

“Why do I always have to swab the mouth?”

“Sam does the thinking, I do the microscope thing, and you’re the grunt work.”

“Listen here, you damned—”

“—yeah, yeah. Get over it. You never complain about legwork when bars are involved.”

“Poking at a dead guy’s tongue like it’s a hunk of steak is not _legwork._ ”

“Look, if you can figure out how to use all of Sarah’s stuff then feel free. Until then you get the gunk and I’ll look at the gunk.” You closed your notebook with a ‘snap.’ “And don’t even talk to me about gross. Usually _I’m_ the one scraping organs off the ground, or in most cases, scraping them off of _me_. Remember the Rugaru in Benton?”

“Dude, I _just_ finished eating.”

You piled your research back into your arms and headed to the exit alongside the taller Winchester brother, conversing about different body parts that had been left behind and which areas of the bodies may have degraded the most and why. Dean stood and stretched, enjoying that mild _crack_ that reverberated from between his shoulder blades. 

“Gonna’ have to put a rain check on that whole dual ‘happy and sad’ phenomenon, ‘kay, Cas?”

“Oh, it’s quite alright, Dean.”

The hunter arched a brow. “You were pretty concerned about it two minutes ago.”

The angel nodded. 

“Indeed. But it appears as if my somber mood has left me,” he hummed, smiling after the pair heading out the door. “I will let you know if it returns.”

Dean followed his friend’s gaze and his eyes narrowed in disbelief. _No._ No way. Did Cas…? Really? _Really?_ I mean, it was bound to happen at some point or other. Attractions were part of being human, not that Cas was really _human,_ but… But it had to be on the fucking demonic shrimp of all the freaking—

Dean ran a hand through his hair in exasperation. 

Great. Just great. There was nothing _wrong_ with you per se—nothing detrimental at least. But you was a sassy little shit who kept things bottled up for way too damn long and then would freaking _explode_ like nobody’s business. And he was just looking out for Cas’s wellbeing here, one guy to another. You were a great friend, but that was one bag of crazy even Dean Winchester wasn’t willing to open. 

“Hey, Cas—”

And just as he was about to steer the angel clear of the storm, a devilish part of the hunter’s brain stopped him.

If Cas really liked you, then this was something he could use to his advantage. For once in all the time they’d known each other, Dean would have some kind of leverage—leverage over what, he wasn’t quite sure yet. But it was an extra card in his hand nonetheless and he was never one for turning down a bit of dirt. 

“Yes, Dean?”

“Nothing, nothing. Let’s get this show on the road.”

The elder Wicheter’s lips twisted into that shit-eating grin of his as he watched Cas clamor into the back seat next to you. He had to keep himself from rubbing his hands together and cackling like some B-Grade Bond villain. 

Oh, _this was going to be good._


	2. Conspiring

"Alright. Pink slime time, Egon. I'll head over that way and, shrimp, you get those back woods where the lake breaks off into the stream. Cas, you and Sam can—"

"I do not think Y/N should be on her own when this creature is hunting young women."

Your eyes narrowed. 

"I've hunted far worse without having the Winchesters tagging along as butt buddies."

"Butt buddies?" Sam frowned and you shot him a dashing grin. The angel stared on blankly, though there was without a doubt a smidgen of annoyance hiding beneath that cool mask of his. 

"Look, Cas," you sighed, "I appreciate the concern but if we all stay together as a group, it'll take three times as long to find anything useful, maybe more. And all we need to do is collect some samples. Once I can get what I need, we’re out of here." You glanced at the elder Winchester. “Right?”

Dean observed Cas for a moment or two before loudly clearing his throat. "I mean, ya' know, we don't _really_ have to split up."

You frowned. "What're you talking about? We always split up. And it's usually _your_ idea."

"Well then," Dean clapped a hand firmly on your shoulder, "why don't _you_ go with Cas and I'll go off with Sam."

"How does this solve anything?!"

“It just does! Look, you’ll thank me later, okay?"

You made a face but turned on your heel to start making your way to the mouth of the stream. You nodded to Cas and the angel fell into step beside you, diligently scanning the ground for anything that could be of use. 

Sam watched on in confusion as the pair headed into the woods. He turned to his brother once they were out of sight, arms crossed stubbornly over his chest and determined frown set firmly in place. 

"Dude, what are you doing?"

"I'm pulling a Tracy McMillan."

"What?"

Dean maneuvered around a particularly water saturated looking heap of moss and muck. "I'm setting up flyboy with our resident shrimp."

Sam's mouth fell open in shock. "You've got to be kidding."

Dean snorted.

"What? You can't feel the sexual tension? I could probably cut that shit with a knife at this point and serve it at Thanksgiving dinner." It was just like that one blonde nurse on ‘Doctor Sexy’ who’d been pining after this surgeon guy for like three seasons now. Things needed to move along. Dean may not have been able to reach through the TV screen to control the actions that played out before him on said Emmy worthy Sitcom, but he certainly could attempt to influence what was going on not three feet from his face. 

"They _hate_ each other!" 

"Uh, if I recall, they've saved each other more than once,” he argued. “I don't call that hate."

"Fine," Sam conceded. "Strongly dislike."

"You're grasping at straws, Sammy."

"Y/N tried to _stab_ him last week—”

“—who doesn’t want to take out some anger on a guy who’ll just brush it off like he’s the terminator?”

“— _with his angel blade_.”

Dean faltered.

“Well… who can blame her?!” he defended. “Sometimes I want to poke the guy full of holes too! And besides, Cas is the one that likes _her._ I’m just helping him along.”

Sam’s brow furrowed. “How do you even know that?”

“Call it my romantic intuition.” 

“Okay, Mr. One-Night-Hookup, tell me more about how you know so much about functional relationships.”

“Careful there, Sammy. I hear if you make a bitch-face long enough it’ll freeze that way forever.”

Sam sighed. “Look, Dean, I get that you want to make everything perfect for everyone all the time and mess around in their business as much as you can, but has it occurred to you that neither of them _wants_ to be together?” he asked. “Cas is busy enough between us and Heaven and Y/N… well, who even knows? Have you ever even seen her hit on a guy? Or do anything but terrify the ones that come up to her?”

“…no.”

“What if she, _ya’ know_ —”

“Dude, before you even say it, _no_. No chick that’s into chicks would make the comments about David Bowie’s spandex that she does. Seriously. Even Charlie won’t watch _Labyrinth_ with her anymore.”

“…fair point. But still. What if she’s just not interested in a relationship? Besides, do you really want to see the two of them—”

“Uh, no. The terror that is Shrimp and Angel PDA aside,” Dean interrupted, “why don’t you think it’d be a good idea? Let’s think ‘practically’ here then, seeing as you’re all about that. If Cas is hitched to Y/N, don’t you think he’ll come more often to help us rather than blow us off for God knows what reason?”

“For _Heaven_ , Dean.”

“So he says. Seriously. It’s gettin’ old.”

“Dean—”

“ _I’m not seeing any gunk collecting, Winchester._ ”

The two brothers looked up in unison to see you and Cas making your way back over to them. You were poking at a clump of moss in a tiny container, seeming thoroughly enthralled. You stopped a few feet from them and slipped the sample into your pocket.

“Chick flick moment?”

Sam sighed. “I wish.”

You arched a brow. “Is Dean being an idiot?”

“When is he not?” The two of you laughed and said loveable nitwit sent you both withering glares that could have sent a demon hightailing in terror. Well, maybe a lower class demon. Crowley probably would have giggled. 

“Find anything interesting?” Sam asked.

Cas nodded. “Y/N discovered a rather fascinating sample of feces.”

Dean gawked.

“ _Feces_ , shrimp?”

“Scat, shit, whatever you want to call it,” you shrugged and plucked another container from your pocket to wave in Dean’s face. The hunter’s nose twitched up in disgust at the brown goop. _There was no way that was coming back with them his car, contained or otherwise._

“And you swiped something from nature’s toilet _because_ …?”

"Because why not."

“I believe that in this instance Y/N knows what she is doing, Dean,” Cas defended. “We were inspecting the area for unique samples and she believes this may be helpful.”

Dean glanced pointedly to Sam as if to say ‘He's whipped, dude—I freaking told you so,’ to which the taller Winchester responded with a particularly bitchy, unamused roll of the eyes. The four of you began to trek back to the Impala and Dean turned to get one last word in.“Whatever you say, man. But, shrimp, if you get any of that on my seats, I will _murder_ you."

"Violently?"

"No one will ever be able to find your corpse.”

Cas’s brow furrowed in concern but you simply shrugged. 

“Fine by me.”


	3. for science

“All of our victims have been found near or in the water—always soaked to the bone, and as of late,” Sam cleared his throat, “missing quite a few of those bones as well.”

“Whatever it is, it’s eating people. Bit by bit. But there’s something odd…” You shuffled through the notes, looking for the medical reports, “For each and every victim, the heart and liver have remained perfectly intact. But the rest of them that was left behind… ” more shuffling, “It’s all mush. Well, not exactly _mush_ , but it’s decomposing way too fast.” 

You handed Dean the papers and he observed them with a furrowed brow. 

“So this Hannibal Lecter wannabe is pickier than we thought?”

“Maybe…” you frowned, returning to your ruffling—eyes forever roving the piles of papers strewn across the desk. “At first I was thinking rituals. But then there are the livers... Rituals tend to involve hearts, yes, and usually eyes, flesh, or blood. I’ve never heard of one involving a _liver_. Unless we’re talking about an alcoholic witch looking for a transplant.”

“So now what?” Dean sighed, rubbing at his eyes, exhausted.

“One of the victims lived right down the road,” Sam piped in. “She moved here alone a few weeks ago so there’s no one really to talk to about her, but I could look around inside her house—see if I can find anything. Hex bags, blood, anything.”

“Good. Great.”

“And we’ll camp out here and do some more research.”

A heavy sigh.

“ _Great._ ”

“Dean, if you don’t stop complaining, I will shove these notebooks so far up your lazy ass you’ll be tasting cheap paper and ink for _weeks_.”

“Alright, alright. Jesus Christ…”

Half an hour later and you sat in silence, fiddling with the focus on the age-old microscope. The water samples were heating and the remainder of your lovely fecal sample was on ice. Now all that was left was to sit back and see what happened.

“Dean.”

The hunter looked up from where he was all but buried beneath mountains of books and notes. 

“What?”

“Where’s my silica?” 

“Right where you left it.”

More fiddling.

“Go get it.”

“ _Seriously?_ ”

A familiar, bulbous, bag was shoved in front of your face and you flinched back. Castiel looked at you expectantly and you tentatively plucked the chemical filled pouch from his hands. 

“Uh… thanks, Cas.”

“You are very welcome, Y/N.”

You stared at the angel for a moment in confusion before returning to your sample. Dean watched as your eyes flickered back and forth from the goop, to Cas, and back to the goop and the hunter wondered if you’d figured it out this quickly. A spark of panic shot through his veins. Sure, that was the end product Dean wanted, but he needed more time to exploit this first.

“Hey, Cas…” you paused. “You know, it’d be awesome if you could grab the glass too.”

“Of course.”

The bulky slab appeared on your desk almost instantaneously. 

“And maybe that notebook over there too.”

This too was placed neatly beside you.

“And my water.”

…

“And that pen that Dean stole from me earlier.”

…

“You know, I should probably check my phone. Where is—oh. Thanks, Cas.”

…

“It’d be super helpful if you could find my red notebook in that pile over there.”

…

“It’d be super _duper_ helpful if you could head back to the lake and get samples from the grass where we found the scat.”

Castiel nodded obediently and disappeared. 

Dean made a face. “Really?” 

You shrugged and returned to your microscope. “He doesn’t seem to mind.”

The hunter scrubbed a hand over his eyes. _Goddamn it, Cas._ Dean didn’t know much of your preferences in particular, but he _did_ know a Hell of a lot about women. And being a subservient doormat was _not_ going to get the angel laid anytime soon. Dean watched as you continued to fidget with the dials on the microscope.

“That thing looks like it’s seen better days.”

“It’s a hunk of metal, Dean. I doubt it cares what it looks like.”

“Maybe you should get a new one.”

Your fingers stilled for a moment.

“We’ve been over this.” You replied, cold. “It’s Sarah’s. It stays.” 

Sarah had been your partner before meeting up with Sam and Dean, and though you hadn't seen her in almost a year now, you were still overly protective of both her and her lousy equipment. 

“Right. How could I forget?” Dean grumbled. “Well, I guess it’s not too weird,” he continued nonchalantly, “seeing as _she_ forgot about it. Forgot about a lot more than that stupid microscope if we’re being honest here,” he finished and quickly dove back into his notes before you could turn and bite his head off. 

Sarah had been a timid waif of a thing with hair the color of hellfire and a face full of freckles. She and Shrimp had been in their final year of undergrad up at some school in Boston when the redhead’s parents had come to an untimely end at the hands of a spiteful witch. The two friends had partnered up to bring the killer to justice when the police had dropped the case (in this instance, a traditional burning at the stake was _more_ than justified) and had been hunting the things that went bump in the night ever since. That was, at least, until about ten months ago. 

While you had no plans of leaving the life, Sarah hadn't necessarily been able to cut it. She'd ducked out after a nasty wendigo hunt to drink away her sorrows and never returned. Dean had liked her plenty, but your insistence that the redhead would return always left a sour taste in his mouth—not because of your blindness to the matter, no, but because of your backstabbing ‘friend.’ Family didn't end with blood, and you'd uprooted yourself and your life to make sure that her kin was avenged. The two of you should have stuck it out together forever. But alas, your compadre had absconded into the night leaving you with an oddball collection of scientific mumbo jumbo from her university days and an incredibly misguided sense of devotion. It was like the little kid who still thought daddy got lost on the way home from buying milk ten years ago and could be back any day.

“I hope this sampling will suffice.” 

You smiled tightly, obviously still peeved about Dean’s passive aggressive jab. “Thank you, Castiel.”

You switched out the gunk currently under the lens perhaps a bit too forcefully, all but shattering the delicate glass slides and sending smelly samples splattering. The angel observed you in silence, brow knit together tightly as he pondered. He seemed hesitant to speak. 

“Is anything the matter, Y/N?”

“Oh, everything’s fine,” you hummed, “Just Dean beating at a dead horse. _Again_.”

The elder Winchester scowled and you impaled him with a particularly venomous glare. 

More brow furrowing. “Dean was attacking an animal?”

You sighed, clearly exasperated, and turned to spread silica onto the glass, abandoning Sarah’s microscope. “It’s just an expression.” 

“I… see.”

You stood and made your way to the door, sample and smeared glass piled in your arms. “I need to get the stuff out of the trunk to set up the development chamber. It’ll take a while, as always. Don’t wait up.”

“I could assist you, if you would like—” Cas offered, but the door had slammed without any acknowledgement. 

The angel looked physically deflated and Dean sighed.

“Don’t take it too hard, man. She always gets pissy when I bring up the deadbeat.” 

“Deadbeat?”

“ _Sarah_.”

Cas blinked slowly, obviously quite befuddled. “Sarah was hardly any sort of vagabond. If I recall, she was anything but idle or beggarly. She was quite an intelligent and motivated individual.”

Dean snorted and flicked idly through the worn pages of one of your notebooks. “Doesn’t change the fact that she jumped ship.”

“Are you saying,” the angel began tentatively, eyes widening a bit as if he’d finally come to some miraculous conclusion, “that Y/N is still distressed because of Sarah’s departure?” 

“Sort of, it’s more…” Dean paused and ran a hand through his hair. “Look, you remember how crappy it was when you went looking for God and he was MIA?”

Castiel’s lips twisted a bit in distaste at the unpleasant memory.

“Of course I do.”

“Well think of it like that, except that Y/N is still expecting God—err, Sarah—to come back,” the hunter explained. 

“I could always find Sarah for her,” Cas suggested. “Do you think that would help—to know that her friend is alive and well?” 

“Honestly, Cas…” Dean turned to look out the grimy motel window. He could just make out your back on the other side, hunched over the open trunk of the impala. If you were the kind of chick that burst into tears at every emotional bump in the road, surely you’d be sobbing into the car’s interior. But you weren’t. You would never mention this again for as long as you lived. He wasn’t sure which he preferred. “I think it might just make it worse.”

The angel followed his gaze and nodded. “I understand.”

“Good. That’s good.” Dean moved to return to the monotony of deciphering your notes when an idea struck him nicely right in the base of his skull. He closed the notebook and turned back to his rather pensive looking friend. “Hey, Cas, you like Shrimp, don’t you?”

“I can’t say. I have never tried it.”

Dean had to resist the urge to roll his eyes. “Not the pink slimy thing, Cas. _Shrimp_ shrimp. Y/N.”

“Ah,” he hummed in understanding. “Yes. Of course I do. Why do you ask?” Then, in what Dean could only infer was concern, “Do I seem overly cruel? Or perhaps insensitive? I try my best to—”

“No, no,” he waved his hand in dismissal. “You’re a regular Mr. Rogers. I was just thinking that maybe, _just maybe_ , you should do something nice for her.”

Cas tilted his head in obvious confusion. “Do I not do that already?”

“Well something _extra_ nice then.”

“Such as?”

“I don’t know, man. Flowers? Chocolate? That kind of thing?”

Castiel’s eyes moved back to the window. “And that would improve her mood?”

“You betcha’.”

The angel was gone before Dean could blink.

“What are you doing?”

Dean looked up to see you situating yourself back at your claimed desk. He reclined lazily against the wall.

“Nothing.”

“Then _start_ doing something.”

“Last time I checked, this was a partnership, not a dictatorship.” 

You narrowed your eyes and opened your mouth to reply when your noticed a particular lack of heavenly soldiers in the room. You swiveled this way and that before finally turning back to Dean. “Where’s Cas?”

“Who knows? I’m not his babysitter.”

You grumbled something under your breath that Dean couldn’t catch before pulling something from the mess spread over your work space. You held it up for Dean to see.

“We’ve got a problem.”

“And that problem is…?” he squinted. “A smear? So what? This happens all the time.”

“No,” you frowned, flipping through the papers on your desk. “Smears only show up in the TLC if the concentration isn’t diluted enough.”

“Then _dilute it_ more. Seriously, shrimp. What’s the issue?”

You looked on the verge of pulling your hair from your head. “Dean, this is _water_ , it _can’t_ be diluted anymore! Don’t you see the problem?!” You shuffled through some more papers and removed another. “This is from the feces.”

“It looks the same.”

“Well it _shouldn’t_. Dean, scat is usually a seven, and lake water is supposed to be around a six. A little more basic or acidic—that’s all normal, but this, this is _insane_. It’s like if the lake was filled with vinegar, or maybe bleach. I can’t tell if it’s high or low from this smear alone, but I _do_ know that something is seriously—”

“ _I could not find decent chocolate within the vicinity, but—_ ”

“Cas!” Your eyes caught onto the elegant bouquet in his arms and your face lit up like a little kid who had locked herself in a candy shop. “Where have you been? Who cares. It doesn’t matter. Oh my God, thank you, this is perfect. I don’t know how you just _know_ what I need, but this, this is great. This is perfect.”

The angel looked mighty proud of his apparent accomplishment and Dean was feeling a bit of that bravado himself—like a proud teacher watching a student finally succeed. Well, that was until you began tearing petals from the lovely flowers and shoving them into an empty container. The hunter’s grin crumpled but the angel just seemed content that _you_ were content.

“Shrimp, what the actual fuck—”

You held up a finger. 

“Shh.” You dumped the remainder of the lake water sample over the petals and began to mash them together with the end of your pencil. “Science.”

“ _Shrimp_ —”

Within a few seconds the once brilliant crimson rose petals had turned a mushy purple, then a brilliant blue. 

“It’s… Ammonia? No, no. Too blue. Lye…?” Your eyes widened and you smacked your palm against your forehead. “Lye! Of course it’s lye! It all makes sense. The mush! The tissues!” 

You literally looked like you were about to seize and wind up lying in a pool of vomit while you convulsed on the floor. Dean moved closer to you cautiously, as if you were some kind of wild creature, though to be honest he may have preferred that at the moment. At least animals were _predictable._

“Y/N, what the _Hell_ did you just do?”

You bounced up to Castiel and threw your arms around him in a quick, incredibly tight, hug. “Thank you, thank you, thank you, _thank you_. Cas, you are literally the best.”

The angel was practically _glowing_ with pride, chest puff and all. 

“It was no trouble, I assure you.”

You smiled in gratitude before turning to the door. “Grab your keys, Deano. We’re going to pick up the Moose and then we need to swipe some acid. And not the fun kind.”

“Seriously, shrimp. Are the chemicals getting to you? Because if you need to sleep off some kind of funk, I’m totally fine with—”

“The only thing I’m high on is knowledge,” you interrupted with a grin. “Now, up, up, up. I may not know what this thing is, but I think I know how to kill it.”


	4. Green

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> For ZayaP—jealous Cas, as recommended :D

“This is a bad idea—no, strike that, Shrimp, this is the _worst_ idea.”

“Shut up and keep pouring your vinegar.”

“For once, I have to agree with Dean here, Y/N,” Sam spoke up, noticeably hesitant to face your wrath. “Isn’t this, ya’ know, bad for the lake or something…?”

Said lake water was foaming and fizzing and stunk something fierce.

“Yes. Most certainly.” You nodded, shaking the last drops of your gallon into the lake. “But it’s already dead. Nothing could survive in sodium hydroxide for this long. Except for our monster of course. Water.”

Castiel handed you a container of spring water and you began to dump that too.

“Look, I _explained_ it to you already. The vinegar and water neutralize the lye—which this thing obviously needs to live in—and releases heat on top of that. This thing seems to like the cold water, so its basic environment going vamoose and then it getting hot is going to piss it off and BAM. It’ll either keel over or come out to attack us. What is it that you two don’t get?” you snapped, exasperated. “Cas has been more than happy to go along with this. And I doubt he understands a single word of what I was saying.”

_That’s because the traitor just wants to get lucky,_ Dean thought spitefully, tossing the empty vinegar carton aside and reaching for a gallon of water. _Stupid horny angels, stupid heavenly crushes, stupid Shrimp_. Sure, it would be nice to see the two together and for his friend to be _happy_ , but at the same time, it was awful that the Shrimp had another player on her team when it came to her ridiculous shenanigans. 

“Y/N is very knowledgeable when it comes to matters such as this,” the seraph defended. As Dean knew he would. “We should trust her.”

“Do you not _see_ that this stupid lake is _bubbling_ like you pumped it full of Alka-Seltzer?”

“What part of ‘chemical reaction’ do you not understand?” You all but snarled, thoroughly fed up the Winchester’s distrust in you and your judgments. “Let’s remember who has degree in Biology here, shall we?”

“Well, not you,” Dean shrugged, tossing the newest emptied container to the side. Sam shot him a stern glare in warning and shook his head rapidly back and forth, hoping his brother would get the message to just _shut up_ for once in his life. “You can thank your ol’ pal _Sarah_ for that—” 

If the Kelpie hadn't lunged from the water like some kind of demonic jack rabbit at that exact moment to attack them, Sam was sure that Dean would have lost his head. Or at the very least received a swift and well deserved knee in the crotch. 

.

.

.

“Stop leering at the door, Cas. She’s not coming out.”

The angel frowned over at the elder hunter who was holding a damp washcloth over the still-bleeding gash on his leg. 

“Y/N is injured. She should let us help her.”

“It’s not that bad,” Sam cut in, pressing an icepack to his sore ribs. “From what I could tell, it was just a dislocated shoulder and a few scrapes. She’ll be fine. Besides, it’s probably better that she cool off for a bit,” he finished, shooting a pointed glare at his brother.

Dean rolled his eyes but Cas’s narrowed in confusion.

“She is upset?” A pause, as if he was churning over the thought. “Because Dean brought up Sarah.”

“ _Ding, ding, ding_ —we’ve got a winner.”

Sam shot him one the nastiest bitch faces Dean had seen in quite a while. He scoffed and turned back to nursing his leg. 

“It’s a… sensitive topic,” Sam explained, tentatively peering over at the bathroom as if you would emerge to snap at him for even _daring_ to talk about it. “Y/N loves Sarah a lot, and Sarah cared about her a lot too, but… well, it wasn’t enough to really keep them together—to keep Sarah here. And Y/N is still hoping she’ll come around. Dean and I have seen enough hunters and enough of this life to know she’s not coming back, but…”

“But Y/N does not give up hope,” Cas finished. “Is that correct?”

Sam nodded. “Right.”

“Do you think…” the angel looked hesitant now, worried, “that Y/N would ever follow her? That she may leave?”

Dean snorted. “Trust me, Cas, you don’t have to worry about a thing. Shrimp’s not going anywhere. She’s too damn loyal and stubborn for her own good. Straight up Hufflepuff.”

“What is a ‘hufflepuff’?—”

You emerged from the bathroom then, covered in goopy anesthetic and bandages.

“Sam, I can’t get my shoulder.”

“Did you do the whole arm-lift thing?”

“Well, duh.” You tried to demonstrate but winced and lowered your arm back to your side. “But it’s a bit not that much fun.”

“Great grammar, Shrimp.”

Your top lip curled in distaste but Dean ignored it and instead vacated his spot on the bed. He patted the motel’s grimy comforter and you lay down with a sigh, letting your arm drape over the edge.

“Be gentle with me.”

“Yeah, yeah. You’re a fragile butterfly,” he joked. You rolled your eyes but he caught a teensy smirk playing over your mouth. Your fingers gripped his own as he got ready yank and Dean immediately felt rather than saw the discontentment of a certain seraph. He glanced behind him at the displeased angel but found Cas’s gaze trained firmly on the opposite wall. “Ready, Shrimp?”

You sighed dramatically and tossed your other arm over your eyes. “As I’ll ever be, Deano.”

“On three. One—” He pulled. Your nails bit into his wrist and your shoulder made an oh so lovely _grind, grind, POP_ sound. 

“Holy fucking Christ, _OW_.”

“All done, champ.”

You sat up slowly, rubbing at your sore muscles. “I thought you said on three.”

“When do I _ever_ actually do it on three?”

You collapsed back against the pillows. “Yeah, yeah. You better just make sure to get me a damn good burger when you’re out because that fucking _hurt_ and was a thousand percent absolutely not worth it.”

.

.

.

“Cas, can you grab some sodas.”

Shrimp didn’t drink. Like, at all. No alcohol. Not in the morning, not in the afternoon, and not even in some seedy bar in the middle of the night. No beers, no whiskey, no nothing. Dean shuddered at the thought of dredging through life without his precious ‘hunter’s helper,’ but somehow you seemed to still manage just fine. Well… as ‘fine’ as any of them could ever be.

So Miss Special Snowflake always needed something extra—a carton of juice, some cans of Sprite, whatever. Apparently his perfect diet just wasn’t good enough for her or the sasquatch. 

Dean looked up from the basket in his arms filled with beer and both cheap junk food and slightly _less_ cheap junk food alike (twas the life of bargain shopping at a gas station). The angel was staring off into space with a particularly irked glower, even in comparison to his usual dour pout. 

“Dude.” No reply. “ _Cas_.”

“Yes, Dean?”

“Something wrong?”

“No.”

_So it was this game, was it?_

Dean sighed and maneuvered around the moping seraph to reach the sodas. “Ya’ know, shrimp plays this same stupid schmeck all the time—and she’s still a miserable loser. So don’t bottle it up.”

“There is nothing _wrong_ with me, Dean.”

The hunter rolled his eyes and began scanning the racks of chilled sodas. _Pepsi? No. Root beer maybe. Haven’t had that for a while…_ He turned. “Hey, Cas. Which do you think Shrimp would want?”

He shrugged, looking very much like a grumpy child in his oversized trench coat. “I believe you would know that better than I.”

_Okay,_ then. 

Dean sighed. “We have to pick up burgers on the way back, so maybe I can just get her something from there...” he trailed off, eyes catching on the ‘home baked’ desserts display and a lovely little apple pie sitting beneath. 

Cas’s gaze followed the hungry, hungry, hunter as he slipped the pastry into the basket. 

“Y/N does not like cinnamon.” 

“Nope.”

His brow furrowed. “Should you not get something that the two of you can both enjoy?”

“Who the Hell said anything about this being for the ‘two of us?’” Dean shot back and Cas’s eyebrows scrunched up even further. He patted the pie’s box gingerly. “This lovely lady is for me, myself, and I.”

The angel hummed in confusion and… distaste?

“I always assumed that humans in relationships shared everything with one another.”

Woah, _woah, woah._ What?

Dean stared back, openmouthed and green eyes wide in shock. “What the freaking _fuck_ are you talking about?”

Cas arched a singular brow, managing to look both peeved and condescending all at once. “Perhaps that is only in functional partnerships…?”

Now, you were cool and all and Dean would gladly lay down his life for yours if the situation arose (and he was certain you would do the same for him), but the elder Winchester wouldn’t have _dated_ you even if you were the last chick on Earth— _well_ … ok. Maybe in that instance. But _still_. Dean Winchester was hardly one to believe in cooties, but if the disease _had_ existed then he was certain you of all people would be the one to carry it. And even after all that romantic disinterest was put aside, he was _still_ offended by that little underhanded jab.

“Well, ya’ know, to be ‘functional partners’ we would have to be _partners_ in the first place.” 

More skeptical brow raising. “Are you not?”

“No!”

Now the angel looked quite befuddled. “Are you… certain?”

“Jesus Christ, Cas, when someone is in a relationship they _know_. It’s a not a damn guessing game. Relationships are supposed to be _open_ things— ” he stopped, frustrated. There was absolutely no way he was going to have this conversation right now in a Gas n’ Sip. “Look, I love Y/N—like a _sister_.” His face scrunched up in distaste. “It would be like _incest_ , okay? And I’m not about to go all _Game of Thrones_ and pull off the Lannister sibling thing.” Just the thought of it made his stomach churn. 

Castiel looked both immensely relieved, properly addled, and appeased all at once. 

“I… see. I just _assumed_ … Pet names and emotionally charged arguments are all signs of—” he trailed off, as if rethinking each and every observation he’d ever made of the pair. “You always seemed so concerned for both her mental and physical health—”

“Never assume, Cas,” Dean sighed, moving to the register. “It makes an ass out of you and me.”

“I apologize then,” Castiel frowned, ducking his head a bit as if thoroughly ashamed. 

“S’okay, Cas.” He hefted the overflowing basket onto the counter. “Attachment leads to jealousy. The shadow of greed that is.”

“Pardon?”

“It’s Yoda, ya’ know, from the third—you know what, forget it.”


	5. shake it off

_“—got nothing in my brain—”_

The hunter scrubbed a hand over his face. 

_“—at least that’s what people say, mmhmm—”_

“Dude. Turn it _off_.”

The volume twitched up another level and Dean was a bit worried you’d blow out the cheap speakers of the motel’s clock radio. You popped the last of your burger into your mouth and shot him a lackluster glare.

“Don’t act like you don’t love it.”

“I _don’t_ love it.”

“You are tapping your foot, Dean,” Castiel pointed out from his place sitting stiff and formal on the second motel bed. “And your fingers are drumming as well—whether subconsciously or otherwise. As I am aware, those are all signs of enjoyment.”

_“—but I keep cruisin.’ Can’t stop, won’t stop moving—”_

“Shut your mouth.”

_“—It’s like I got this music in my mind saying it’s gonna’ be alright—”_

At this point there was little coming from the small radio that was comprehensible—high pitched static overriding the song as you tried to push the volume to and beyond its limit. 

_“—cause the players gonna’ play, play, play, play, play—”_

You wagged a fry in Dean’s face when his lips twisted up in annoyance. “And the haters gonna’ hate, hate, hate, hate, hate. Take it away, Sam!”

The younger Winchester arched a brow in amusement but didn’t bother to join in, instead turning back to his laptop with a shake of the head and a contented grin.

_“—Baby, I’m just gonna’ shake, shake, shake, shake, shake—Shake it off! Shake it off!—”_

You skidded back and forth across the motel room, doing an awkward little jig as you searched for more of the snacks Dean had picked up when he was out. Don’t get me wrong, you loved the classic rock that blasted from the Impala’s stereo plenty, and you’d never been the biggest fan of either pop music or the lovelorn crooning of Taylor Swift. But… it was just so damn _catchy_. And amazing. And Gods, if you could play this song all day, everyday, you would. Without hesitation. You’d have the Winchesters play it at your funeral if you could manage to guilt them into it. 

_“Heartbreakers gonna’ break, break, break, break, break.”_

You pointed to Dean. 

“And the fakers gonna’ fake, fake, fake, fake, fake.” 

His deep scowl brought a smirk to your own lips and you continued to prance clumsily around the cramped quarters. “The more you deny your feelings for this masterpiece, the more annoying I’ll get.”

The hunter took a swipe at you as you passed but you danced around the hit, spinning in a sloppy little circle and arms practically flailing at your sides. You laughed and held your hand out to him, asking silently for him to join you. The elder brother scowled at you and crossed his arms petulantly over his chest. You shrugged. Fine if he was going to be a brat about it, then he wasn’t invited to your lovely little dance party. Not that this was much of a ‘party,’ or even ‘dancing’ really. But it did put you in a fantastic mood and the endorphins flooding your veins were more than worth the lunacy or how absolutely ridiculous you were sure you looked. Sarah and you had done stuff like this all the time after particularly sucky hunts or stressful nights filled with research and dead-ends. It was a tradition! Sort of.

_“—Cause the players gonna’ play, play, play, play, play—”_

Well you weren’t going to dance alone. You snatched Cas’s hand and hauled him off the bed. Saying the poor angel looked startled was an understatement, but he didn’t freeze up and refuse to budge so that was certainly a good sign.

_“—I'm just gonna’ shake, shake, shake, shake, shake—”_

Castiel stood awkwardly, unsure what to do or how to react, as you dragged him around the room by the fabric of his trench coat. You laughed and shook your head, not quite sure what you had been expecting. You spun around him in a circle and you watched as he tried to keep up with your spastic movements while not _actually_ moving himself. His head was practically swiveling back and forth like an owl’s as he attempted to keep track of what was going on.

_“—Just think, while you been getting down and out about the liars and the dirty, dirty cheats of the world, you could’ve been getting down to this. sick. beat—”_

You sent a pointed look at Dean and he rolled his eyes, flopping back into the pillows with a sigh that honestly sounded much more contented than frustrated. You swung back around to jab your finger at Sam, nearly plowing into Castiel in the process. 

“And to the fella over there with the hella good hair—”

You reached up then to muse the seraph’s hair as well (as if to say, “your hair’s not quite as majestic, but it’s still pretty I promise”) before turning back to Dean, using your water bottle as an impromptu microphone. You tossed an arm around Castiel’s neck and used the poor puppy-man to keep from tumbling over during your awkward routine. 

_“—won’t you come on over, baby, we could shake, shake, shake—”_

The music cut of abruptly and the sound that ripped from your throat was inhuman. 

“DEAN.”

“Hey! It wasn’t me!”

You whirled around to the radio so quickly you could have easily snapped your neck from the whiplash. The poor contraption had gone dark—the once illuminated numbers blank and speakers sparking and cracking as if trying to cough out one final breath. You noticed then that the small, already on the verge of dying, light over the bedside table had also fizzled out too. Huh…

“It was almost over anyways.” He sounded oddly off put, like he’d been enjoying himself as well.

“That is the absolute _worst_ time to end a song,” you shot back.

Dean shrugged. “Touché.” 

You turned to thank Castiel for being such a good sport, only to discover upon inspection that the angel had vanished. You did a quick 180 and determined that the seraph had indeed fled the scene. Perhaps Heaven had called? Or maybe he’d been annoyed. Either was likely. 

Dean seemed to notice his friend’s absence as well. He glanced at the fried light and radio beside him for a moment before scoffing and burrowing deeper into his pillows. 

He didn’t address you again and you turned to head back to your notes. Though Dean made move to talk with you, you could have _sworn_ you heard the hunter hiss something about ‘damn angel boners.’


	6. Ouch

"Mother _fucker."_

The ensuing _snap_ had been loud enough to make even Dean wince. And Dean Winchester did not 'wince' for any old weird cracking noise. But this particularly jarring sound had come from your general direction. And that was never a good thing. 

Once the ghost had been ganked and his gigantic little brother had been detangled from the gross-ass ectoplasm net he'd tripped into, Dean began to search for his missing Shrimp. And lo, there you were, two rooms over and hanging limp half way between the wall of rooms A and B. For a moment, the terror that shot through his heart almost tangled his feet and sent him plummeting to the dusty floorboards. But then you swore colorfully under your breath and the organ jump started once more in a wave of sheer _fury_ because how _dare_ Y/N L/N scare him like that.

He moved to your side carefully. 

"How ya' doing there, Shrimp?"

You spat out a mouthful of blood, though the effect it had ended up being rather pathetic because it came right back down and smacked into your chin. 

"Oh, just _peachy_ , you dick hat."

"Woah, woah, woah. No need for hostility here, Marvin. We come in peace."

You groaned and tried to shift around, only to freeze up with a twitch. "I think I broke something."

"Yeah," Dean whistled, impressed, as he and Sam helped scoop you up and onto your feet. "The _wall_."

"How'd this even happen?" Sam asked, eyeing the crumbling remains and gaping Shrimp-shaped hole. 

You gave a one-shouldered shrug. "I crossed the beams."

Sam rolled his eyes and Dean snorted. 

"But seriously," you winced, "angry ghosts are not the nicest of fellows. And—" you cut off with a strangled gasp, nearly tumbling to the ground before the two Winchesters could each wrap an arm around your torso and prop you upright. "Okay. Ow. Not cool."

"We should call, Cas," Sam said. "This is bad."

"Psh," you rolled your eyes, trying and failing to hide the quiver in your voice and pained flinch. "I've survived worse… besides. There’s no reason to pull him away from Heaven for…” you glanced pointedly at your broken body, “ _this_.”

Dean all but growled. “I think he’d be _more_ pissed if you ignored this.”

How could you not understand how absolutely _panicked_ the angel would get if he saw you like this? The guy mother henned you enough as it was. He’d go into full out angry lion mommy if he knew you were hunched over, bleeding all over a perfectly good floor. 

“Then _you_ call him, loser. I’m out.”

The hunter snarled and glared up to the ceiling. "Cas?"

Nothing. 

“What the fuck.”

You were putting a truly valiant effort into looking like you _weren’t_ putting all of your weight onto Sam. “Told you.”

“Dude,” Sam frowned, “we need to get her out of here. Now. To a hospital preferably.”

“ _No hospitals_ ,” you and Dean said at the same time.

The brothers turned to you and gave another one-shouldered shrug. “I don’t have health insurance.”

“Seriously, shrimp? And here I am worrying about the fact the nearest hospital is four hours away.”

You were carted back to the car and propped carefully in the back. Sam leaned back over you as Dean drove, pressing pills to your lips and trying to assess the worst of the damage. Dean had to hand it to you—you were certainly a little trooper. Even hopped up on an ungodly mix of oxycodone and whatever other drugs his brother had managed to scrape from the bottom of your bag, you still had to be hurting. And hurting bad. And yet there you were, laid out across the backseat of the impala almost languidly and humming that obnoxious Taylor Swift song. Which he kind of, sort of, could tolerate. A little. 

The motel wasn’t the best of places for you to recover, but for now it would have to do. If you needed emergency care, Dean wanted to do it _now_. Screw driving hours and hours when you could be dying on the Impala’s pristine interior. Not that they could tell what was wrong with you or would require treatment, life threatening or otherwise… This was all one big clusterfuck of awful, and if Cas would just get his damn butt _down here_ already, it could all be fixed. 

The three of you were placed around the room in the typical melodramatic fashion—the injured damsel lying pale on the bedspread, the dashing hero perched at her side and awkwardly checking her over to make sure she hadn’t died in the last ten seconds, and the lumbering oaf sidekick-type-thing pacing back and forth on far too long legs. 

"Cas, come on, man." Dean heard Sam say. 

“He’s got to be busy,” he frowned, tapping his foot in fast, anxious beats against the carpeting. “He’s not coming.”

“You're all a bunch of losers," you slurred. "Let me try—" You exhaled sharply through your nose before twisting your hands up in your lap in an awkward "this is totally how the people in church pray" sort of way and closing your eyes. "Dearest Castiel," you began, "who art flying thy fine ass around so high in the sky—if it's not too much trouble, it'd be super cool if you could pop on in right about now and—"

“What is the problem?”

Sam and Dean turned on the seraph in a second, all spitting venom and bared fangs. “Dude, where were you?” “We kept calling you, over and over!” “You can’t just ignore us when you damn well feel like it!” “We needed your help!” “I should put a fucking leash on you, would that help?!” 

Castiel gaped back at them, patented look of mixed horror, shock, and confusion twisting his features. 

You waved at the confounded angel from your placed propped up against every pillow the motel room had to offer.

“Thanks for picking up, dork.”

The bewilderment disappeared from his gaze and he all but hurtled to your side. “You’re hurt?”

“Hence the ring-a-ding-ding,” you slurred, blinking up at him. “You know—your eyes are super blue. You know that, right? It’s like those slushies that Dean won’t let me drink in the car. Or like drain fluid. Or something pretty like that.”

He grasped your chin between his fingers and gently turned your head left and right, trying to assess any damage. “What’s wrong with her? Did she hit her head?”

“Probably,” Dean shrugged. “But all that’s definitely all the painkillers talking.”

“Painkillers?” he repeated, curious.

“The fuzzy pills. But not the heroin,” you supplied helpfully. “Crack is whack, kids.” 

The angel made a face but Sam shook his head at him. “Don’t worry about that, Cas. People are hard to understand when they’re all… drugged up,” he supplied. “Just fix her up and it should go away.”

“Of course,” he nodded, pressing his fingers to your forehead.

You blinked once, twice, and the fog lifted from your gaze. Cautiously you propped yourself up in the bed, twisting your arms forward and back and tentatively pressing your fingers over the more sensitive wounds. If Dean recalled, this was the first time you’d even been injured badly enough that they’d had to drag Cas away from Heaven to heal you—in fact, it may just have been the first time Cas had healed you _ever_. And he remembered how strange the feeling was his first time around, how it felt like heavenly cockroaches were crawling under his skin and chomping away at his bruises. 

You shook your head, almost as if in disbelief. “Holy _heck._ ”

Sam smiled softly. “I know. Pretty nifty.”

“I’ll say!” You grinned, jumping off of the mattress with far too much gusto. Cas stepped forward, hands twitching up and eyes widening as if afraid you’d somehow manage to hurt yourself all over again. You twisted around, eyes roving over the countless bloody and torn patches in your clothing and the gore coating almost every inch of your skin. “I’m putting the terminator to shame here.” 

“Why didn’t you call for me sooner?” Castiel asked you, once again leaning forward to check over your injuries. You sat quietly and politely with your hands folded all nice and neat in your lap as the angel raked fingers down your arms and over your face, looking for any sore spots.

“ _We_ did call you,” Dean frowned, crossing his arms over his chest. “What’s the matter, Cas? Sammy and I suddenly not important enough for you anymore?”

Cas looked properly abashed. He shifted back and forth, dress shoes scuffing against the motel’s grimy carpet. 

“Oh, take the stick out of your ass, Deano,” you yawned, reaching over to pat Castiel’s shoulder. “It’s not Cas’s fault that he just likes me so much better than you.”

The seraph was looking a bit pink around the edges. 

You sat back on the bed. “Maybe if you had a more charming personality like moi, he’d be willing to answer you.”

“Fuck you, I have a lovely disposition.”

“I’m sure we’re just imagining the grumpiness,” Sam hummed.

“Or the smell,” you added.

“Or the whole ‘let’s hold everything inside and drown it with alcohol’ thing.”

“Hey!”

“And let’s not talk about how he denies his love of Taylor Swift.”

“I do not!—I mean, I don’t like—I—”

“And there you go again.”

“Y/N is indeed more endearing.” Dean turned on Cas with a snarl and the angel backtracked. “Of course, you are also very pleasant to spend time with, Dean.”

“Oh save your breath.”

“Dean, I don’t need to breathe—”

“I don’t care, Cas! God!”

You tugged at the edge of Castiel’s trench coat. “It’s okay, Cas. I still love you.”

Just as with the other day when you’d been belting along to ‘Shake it Off’, the angel poofed out of existence before you could even blink. You stared into the empty air with a furrowed brow and a slow growing frown. After a moment you turned to Sam and Dean.

“Did I do something wrong?”

Dean patted you twice on the shoulder as he passed. “You just need to work on not giving the poor guy so many boners, ya’ feel me?”

Your eyes widened almost comically just as Sam hissed a rather bitchy _’Dean, what the fuck”_ under his breath.

“ _What_?!”

Dean scrubbed a hand over his face. “Goddamnit all.”


	7. let's talk about bees

Dean didn’t consider himself to be a coward. He was a man of action—a rough n’ tough kind of guy who looked Death in the face and offered him queso and chips. No, Dean Winchester did not know the meaning of the phrase ‘to quake in one’s boots’ and he most certainly never tucked his metaphorical tail between his legs and ran. Therefore, he _definitely_ was not ‘hiding’ from you. And he most _definitely_ was _not_ ‘afraid.’

“Come out, come out, wherever you are~”

Then again, if action movies were anything to go by, only the strongest of the strong admitted to their fear. So, yeah. _Maybe_ he was just a teensy weensy bit terrified for his life. But whatever. No reason to quantify it or anything. Besides, giving it a name would give it power. Yeah, that’s right. Deep philosophical shit there.

“There you are, dick.”

The sound that passed through his lips was not a scream. It was a manly exclamation of shock at being found in such an A+ hideaway, and that’s all.

You squeezed in next to him and offered him a beer. Dean inspected it carefully. It was unopened, but you were good. Certainly you could have slipped one of your various chemical concoctions in there somehow. You rolled your eyes at his obvious hesitance and snagged it back from his hands. The cap popped off beneath your fingers and you stared him dead in the eye as you took a swig, face scrunching up in obvious disgust as you forced the mouthful of malty liquor down your throat. You handed it back to him and Dean took a tentative sip.

“Must be serious if you’re willing to put this ‘goddamn wheat poison’ into your body.”

“I stand by my hatred of alcohol,” you frowned, clearly steeling yourself to look like you weren’t about to spit up the small mouthful you’d managed to swallow. “Look, I’m not mad at you or anything, I promise. You just… _surprised_ me is all.”

“Most people go ‘Ahh!’ when they’re shocked,” Dean scoffed, tossing his hands up lightly to illustrate his point, all while carefully avoiding spilling the apparently untainted beer, “not full-body tackle said surpriser to the floor.”

“And most people have the sense not to spring the term ‘angel boner’ on someone who was hurled through a wall not half an hour earlier. Besides,” you wiped at your mouth, still obviously unhappy about your brief tangle with booze, “it’s not like you’re _really_ upset. The back of the Impala? Seriously? You could’ve at least run off into the woods or something.”

Dean rolled his eyes. “Yeah, yeah.”

“Now, going back to that whole ‘angel boner’ thing…” you trailed off. “What were you talking about exactly?”

Dean wanted to bitch face you into the next dimension. Seriously? _Seriously?_ How could you not see it? Sammy was still the smartest person the elder Winchester knew, but you were a close second or third. Dean was somewhere way down on the list, and if he could see it, and Sam could see it, why were you so _blind_? Cas claimed that his ‘people skills’ were rusty, but here you were, an actual person, and you were just as obtuse as the little nerd with wings. 

Dean placed a brotherly hand on your shoulder.

“It’s time we had a chat about the birds and the bees.”

You frowned. “I _know_ what sex is, Dean.”

“But have you ever had to deal with it, is the question.”

“Isn’t that a little _personal_?”

You’d almost bled out before his eyes on the very backseat that you were both lounging against. You and he both strutted around the motel rooms and bunker with naught but flimsy white towels. He bought you Midol and chocolate and restocked all your feminine hygiene products when you were too sore and cranky too move. You always carried extra condoms when the three of you went out to celebrate after a hunt so that Dean would never be left hanging when a casual hookup presented itself. You offered an ear whenever Dean hit a particularly low point or was swallowed by memories of his failures. He was a shoulder to lean on when thoughts of Sarah plagued your mind. Yet somehow talking about your _sex life_ was too personal. 

His thoughts must have shown on his face because you slouched back against the leather with a heavy sigh and pink cheeks.

“There’s not a lot to talk about, okay?”

He arched a brow and you sighed again, defeated.

“ _No_ , okay. I’ve never had to ‘deal with it.’”

“Well, that’s what I’m here for,” he grinned, tossing an arm over your shoulders. “Let Doctor Dean cure what ails you.”

You made a face. “Never call yourself that again and you’ve got a deal.”

“Tough bargain…”

“ _Dean_.”

“Fine, fine. Have it your way, shrimp.”

Your gaze traced the Impala’s interior for a few moments before you turned your focus back to the hunter with a nervous smile.

“So. What was that about ‘angel boners’?”

His grip on your shoulder tightened reassuringly. “Well, you see, Shrimp, when a man really appreciates the lovely curve of—”

“I know what a _boner_ is, Dean!” you snapped, ears burning hot red. “But…” you made a helpless gesture with your hands, as if you were unsure how to explain this properly. “ _Boner_ and _Cas_ don’t really mix, you feel me?”

Oh, Dean felt you. The idea of an angel in a trench coat sporting a hard on was not something he’d ever thought or particularly _wanted_ to see in his short lifetime. But that didn’t mean he couldn’t tease you a bit.

“Well, don’t tell _him_ that,” he hummed. “You’ll hurt the poor guy’s feelings. And his ego.”

Your brow furrowed. “Why would Cas care what _I_ think about his—” There were a butt ton of words that could follow that, and Dean didn’t particularly want to hear _any_ of them. Ever. Especially from your mouth.

“—can you really not tell, Shrimp?” he cut in, mentally high fiving himself for avoiding… ew. “Because out of the two of us, you’re supposed to be the almighty, academic achiever.”

Your eyes narrowed in annoyance for a moment before the irritation flickered into curiosity and then confusion. 

“No way. Uh-uh. Nice try, Winchester.”

Dean frowned. “What?”

“I get what you’re insinuating here, and let me tell you,” you huffed, “People don’t get ‘crushes’ on me, okay? And I know that from experience.”

Fair enough. I mean, it’s not like Dean was snubbing you or anything, but to be honest, you were pretty standoffish. Blunt, a bit wacko, and just, well, _Shrimp_. It was a combination that scared off any potential suitors when they passed through various bars and restaurants. You had been serious about school—like, Sam-level serious. You’d wanted to be a vet or something, and getting into Veterinary School was no walk in the proverbial dog park. He could imagine it now—Shrimp in her early twenties, situated at the very front of the lecture hall and snarling in irritation at anyone who dared break her focus. Yeah, Dean would have steered clear of you too. But this was different. This was _now_. And yeah, you were still a bitch at times. And yes, you were still scary. But Cas wasn’t some college guy only interested in crawling under your covers or a random buzzed dude leaning over a bar counter. 

“Well in case the fact that the man has a halo and wings wasn’t enough to tip you off, last time I checked, Cas wasn’t exactly a _person._ ” 

A frown tugged at your lips. 

“Most things we deal with in this business aren’t ‘people,’ Dean. Just because Cas is an angel doesn’t mean he doesn’t _feel_ like ‘people’ do.”

“ _Exactly_ ,” Dean ground out, frustration building and pressing at his temples in the start of a headache. “Cas still feels things, but it’s _different_. And you know what? Our nerdy little angel decided that he wants to feel that stuff for _you_ , okay?”

“Cas doesn’t treat me any different than anyone else.”

 _Are you fucking_ kidding _me?_

No. _No._ Chill, Deano. He inhaled sharply through his nose, focusing his growing frustration on analyzing your reactions instead. There was a strange pull on your brow, not so much shock or confusion… It almost looked like a sprinkling of _hope_. Okay. That he could work with. You were a scientist, right? That meant you responded best to fact and not goopy emotional ranting. Alright then. Time to pull a Sherlock Holmes on this bitch. 

“Look, Shrimp, let’s think about this rationally okay? No need to be all Jesse Pinkman when we can be Heisenberg, right?”

Your eyes narrowed. “Okay…?”

Good. Great. You were going along with it.

“Do you think Cas considers Sam and me to be his family?” It was a risky first venture perhaps, but he and Sam had christened the angel as one of their own long ago, and Cas had mentioned it once or twice. So it seemed reasonable enough.

“Of course.”

He nodded. “And how does he treat you in comparison to me and Sam?”

Your brow furrowed for a moment in thought. “The… same, I guess?

Dean smacked you upside the head. “ _Err._ Wrong answer, Trebek.”

“He’s the one who _asks_ the questions, dumbass.” 

“Then _ask a question_.”

You paused, chewing over your thoughts carefully for a moment or two. “Alright then. How _does_ he treat me?”

“Like something special.”

You cocked your head in disbelief and Dean had to remind himself that facts were oh so important to the scientific process. He began ticking off observations on his fingers.

“He comes whenever you call. He brought you flowers to make you feel better. He does literally anything you ask of him. He put up with your damn Taylor Swift song and dance routine. He supports your manic decisions. He panics when you’re hurt. He worries about you when you’re upset. Not to mention he was on the verge of ripping my head off my shoulders when he thought we were _dating_ ,” the memory makes Dean shudder, both from the ice in Cas’s glare and the idea that he could be porking a girl who was essentially his little sister. “Should I go on?”

“Woah, woah, woah,” you waved your hands. “Time out. When did _that_ happen?”

“After I fixed your shoulder a week or so ago. When we were at the store. He was lecturing me about the evils of cinnamon and the importance sharing pie with your significant other,” Dean rolled his eyes. You didn’t even _like_ pie that much in the first place. There’s no way the two of you would have ever worked out. Your disdain for alcohol and the key ingredient in the king of pies was just not okay. “He also pretty much flat out said we had a failing relationship and that I was a shit boyfriend, but whatever.”

That hesitant, hopeful tug on your brow was stronger now. You smirked in amusement. “You’re joking.”

“Yeah, I wish. The guy was damn scary.”

“Eh, I don’t know about that. I think you’re just a weenie.”

“Yeah? And you’re a psycho bitch.”

You and Dean shared matching grins. Yours faded into a somewhat shy smile and you ducked your head away to stare out the window. 

“I think we should go back in now. It’s kinda cold.”

“Right.”

You paused, fingers drumming over your thigh. “And if I was to say, call Cas while we were inside and force him to sit down and talk with me, you’d back me up?”

Dean’s lips spread even wider. “Do you even have to ask?”

The hesitance vanished from your grin. “Of course not.”

You’d both made it back into the main entrance of the motel and halfway down the hall before realizing something wasn’t right. The rug outside of your room was scuffed up and rumpled, like someone had paced back and forth outside, or dragged their feet constantly back and forth over the grainy surface. The door was cracked open and he was sure that the both of you had closed it properly on the way out—a standard precaution. 

He held a finger to his lips and you nodded, pulling your handgun from the back of your jeans. Dean twirled a knife between his fingers and counted down on his spare hand. The pair of you barged into the room, all flaming steel and adrenaline. He was expecting to see a hurricane, to find Sam gagged and tied to a chair, demons circling, an angry witch, _anything_. 

He _wasn’t_ expecting his brother’s nervous glare or for Cas to already be present and at attention, looking very much like something had thoroughly rumpled his feathers. 

He wasn’t expecting Sam’s pleading grimace or the very pointed look he shot your way. 

And he most certainly wasn’t expecting Sarah to be slouched, haggard and pale, in the center of the room.


End file.
